Basketball legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has a fascinating piece at Esquire.com this week in
which he shares some of the advice he wishes he could give to his
30-year-old self.

There are a lot of great nuggets of wisdom from the NBA's
all-time leading scorer, including an admonition to learn French
and to cook more often. What caught our eye, though, were his
suggestions that he wished he'd become financially literate at a
younger age.

"I chose my financial manager, who I later discovered had no
financial training, because a number of other athletes I knew
were using him," he recounts. "Consequently, I neglected to
investigate his background or what qualified him to be a
financial manager. He placed us in some real estate investments
that went belly up and I came close to losing some serious coin."

As Abdul-Jabbar acknowledges, his experience is not unusual among
athletes. Countless professional athletes have gone bankrupt
after making tens of millions of dollars over the course of their
careers; baseball star Lenny Dykstra and NFL
quarterback Mark Brunell, for instance, were done in by unwise
investments.

Why pro athletes seem to have a greater tendency to get taken in
by such schemes is unclear. In his Esquire article, Abdul-Jabbar
puts forth one theory: Athletes are used to trusting their
teammates, so when one of them recommends a financial advisor,
they take the recommendation at face value.

Whether you're a basketball star or an average Joe, you obviously
want to do more serious vetting before you sign on with a
financial advisor. There are lots of things you should know
before choosing a money manager -- foremost among them, whether
the person you are hiring is a broker (who only makes investments
with your explicit approval) or an investment advisor, who may
ask you to sign a contract agreeing to let him or her make
investments without first consulting you.